Ubuntu 12.04 (Precise Pangolin) is ready for release in just few hours. Not to forget that this is an LTS release with the longest support cycle offered by Canonical till now.

After you are done with the installation, there would likely be a huge list of things you need to do to make your system up and running. Here is a list of the most important things that you need to do after a successful installation.

Install Updates

Just because you 've installed the latest version of Ubuntu, it
doesn’t mean that you have all the upgrades to the softwares that were
bundled. Open the terminal and run the following

$ sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

Install Additional (missing/required) drivers

If you are using any graphics/video card or sound card or wireless then
you must install the appropriate drivers/softwares for that. Ubuntu
12.04 can automatically detect graphics card and a pop-up window may
appear with the suggestion but you need to make sure that you’re
installing the right driver for the device.

Also If you are using a broadcom Wirless device like me on your machine, you need to install the broadcom kernel resources to make your device work on Ubuntu.

$ sudo apt-get install bcmwl-kernel-source

Install 'ubuntu-restricted-extras'

The metapackage 'ubuntu-restricted-extras' contains nearly everything
essential that you would otherwise need to find and install
individually, as of now that is codecs, Flash plugin, Microsoft fonts
and 'unrar'. Just run this command to install it

Medibuntu
is a packaging project dedicated to distributing software that cannot
be included in Ubuntu for various reasons, related to geographical
variations in legislation Medibuntu regarding intellectual property,
security and other issues. by adding Medibuntu repositories you will be
able to install many softwares like Google-Earth , opera ,Win32codecs ,
Msfonts etc.,

To play encrypted DVDs, the libdvdcss2 package is essential. libdvdcss
is a simple library designed for accessing DVDs like a block device
without having to bother about the decryption. You need Medibuntu repositories to install libdvdcss2

To be able to watch some videos and see flash website in your browser
(Firefox, Opera..), you need to install flash plugin,

$ sudo apt-get install flashplugin-installer

Google Chrome comes with a bundled flash plugin installed, so if you only use Google chrome you may not need to install the flash plugin.

Install Java7

First you need to remove openjdk

$ sudo apt-get purge openjdk*

Now you can install Java7 by adding the following repository:

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:eugenesan/java

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install oracle-java7-installer

Install Ubuntu Tweak

Ubuntu Tweak is a must have application for Ubuntu, it is
an application to config Ubuntu easier for everyone. It provides many
useful desktop and system options that the default desktop environment
doesn’t provide.

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tualatrix/ppa

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak

Install MyUnity

MyUnity is a must have configuration tool for Unity , to install enter the following commands

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:myunity/ppa

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install myunity

Install Gnome Shell

Not a fan of unity, you can install Gnome-Shell in Ubuntu 12.04 from repository by using this simple command:

$ sudo apt-get install gnome-shell

This will install the latest version of gnome 3.4 (but not all gnome 3.4 apps, like Evolution 3.4 etc, as these are not supported in Ubuntu 12.04 )

Install Gnome Classic desktop

Install the classic GNOME desktop by installing the gnome-panel package

$ sudo apt-get install gnome-panel

Install gnome tweak tool

Since Oneiric 11.10, the built-in, default Appearance dialog, while
simple enough, doesn't present you with many options to tweak the
themes, fonts, etc. Gnome Tweak Tool is what you need for this stuff.

$ sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool

Install gnome shell extensions

To get most out of gnome shell you need to install some of the finest gnome shell extensions, to install the gnome shell extensions of your choice, open https://extensions.gnome.org/ using firefox and you can install the extensions of your choice directly from the browser.

Install Faenza Icon theme

Undoubtly the finest Icon theme for Ubuntu, you can download it using the following PPA

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tiheum/equinox

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install faenza-icon-theme

Install Faience Icon theme

This is yet another beautiful theme based on Faenza with redesigned Iconset, to install use the following commands

$ sudo apt-add-repository ppa:suraia/ppa

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install faience

Install KDE and XFCE desktops

If you are not a fan of Unity or Gnome shell or want multiple desktop environments on your machine, then you can give a try installing KDE and XFCE

For KDE

$ sudo apt-get install kde-standard

For XFCE

$ sudo apt-get install xfce4

Install Synaptic Package Manager

If you are a old user of Ubuntu and have nostalgia of using good old synaptic package manager, run the following command to install the synaptic package manager

$ sudo apt-get install synaptic

Enable Global Menu for LibreOffice

By default, Global Menu integration for LibreOffice is not enabled.
That's because there are still some issue that might occur when using
it. However, you can just try your luck with it and if doesn't work
acceptably well, just disable it again. To enable it, just run:

$ sudo apt-get install lo-menubar

And here is a Quicklist of some of the essential apps that you may want on your Ubuntu machine, you can either find it from Ubuntu software center or may need to get it from its respective websites (like Chrome, Skype etc.,)

VLC

GIMP

Pidgin

Chromium Browser

Opera

Google Chrome Browser

Skype

Banshee

Wine

Dropbox

Adobe Acrobat reader

Also don't forget to make a search for your favorite apps and a quick tutorial on how to install these apps on ubuntubuzz blog that we have updated you time to time.

Best of Luck for your new Install.

Related Post :

Installation,
Precise Pangolin,
Ubuntu 12.04

About the Author

Aamir Mustafa is Ubuntubuzz contributor since January 2012. Aamir is Chemical Engineer from New Delhi, India. He have more than 6 years of experience in IT and Software solutions sales. Interested with this author, Contact him trough his social account Facebook , Twitter, Google + and DeviantArt .